New Life, New Rebellion AU rework: What's Being Changed?
Hey guys! Just popping in between trying to get shit done and irl chaos (trailer park managers are no joke sadly and I'm surprised that I don't have grey hairs at 30 yet) and figured why not go into small detail and what I'm gonna change in this AU moving forward. Some very minor and some major perhaps. Let's dive in!
Minus well also give a preview of how the entries will go as possible titles too:
Prologue- From a Butterfly and Into Chains
Act 1- Storming the Castle of Lust
Act 2- Closing the Museum of Vanity
Act 3- Robbing the Bank of Gluttony
Act 4- Exploring the Pyramid of Wrath and Cracking Masks
Act 5- The Fall of the Thieves and the Spaceport of Greed
Act 6- The Casino of Envy and the Herald's Disappearance
Act 7- Corruption on the Cruise Ship of Pride and Revelations
Act 8- Down the Arcane Depths
Act 9- Escape from the Laboratory of Sorrow and Mending Rifts
Epilogue- A New Life Awaits
A possible Strikers entry is definitely something I want to consider. Even more ambitious is that I would maybe consider recycling my own previously planned Strikers Rewrite AU featuring Sumi, Akechi, and Maruki! But that's something to be decided later down the line and how well things go.
Tactica I don't know really? Maybe? Tactica I kinda feel so-so towards admittedly so far but I didn't finish yet so that could change!
Viktor's Persona is being replaced
Yep, after a lot more thinking, I'm gonna give Viktor a different Persona! Based on none other than Faust, namely Goethe's take on him in a play version of Faust's story/legend. I was looking into more ideas and stumbled upon the overall story and it just fits Viktor to a T (someone else also compared him/his arc to Faust as well on here too so I wasn't alone on that). So his primary/1st Tier would be Faust of course while his 3rd Tier would be named after his apparent inspiration: Johann Georg Faust
Of course which variant of his name is up in the air for now but still! So far I was thinking simply Georg to differentiate from Makoto's Persona name and such but we'll see. Speaking of Viktor though...
Viktor's Herald form will play more of a role and I decided on the type of Persona for him
I decided that his Herald form would be more prominent in this story. Namely a form he can change into while in the Metaverse which will later bleed into the real world when Yaldy and later Maruki starts interfering. Much like his powers in the initial concept, the overuse will slowly start to kill him until Jayce finds a way to stabilize all of it. From a gameplay standpoint/scenario though, it gives a similar vibe to Zenkichi's Fury ability mixed with how Showtime attacks are triggered. It would be a special ability he could shift into but it does have specific conditions and side effects. Namely a slow health drain each turn/use due to his canonical health problems/condition and seems to trigger in specific situations such as when Joker, Jayce, or any if not all teammates are knocked down/stunned. Basically emergency/last resort sort of ability along with a way to make him seem less op on it. At least post stabilization that is.
His Persona type I grappled with on and off and even did a quick curiosity poll and well... It humorously ended up 50/50 with half being Navi and the other half being a mix of both Navi and Combat. I think the issue I have is that he's not really the kind of person that would take things lying down the more I thought about it. At least post-canon.
If anything I think going by P5X's combat roles/Persona types for a bit, I think Viktor would be a Strategist and/or Saboteur role(s) whereas Jayce would be more of a Guardian and/or Sweeper role(s).
Point is, I think Viktor wouldn't be the kind to want to stay idle himself.
Plus I'm sorry, as much as I can subscribe to him not being a completely violent person (along with his Arcane VA's own statement), I started to feel like, upon further inspection, he seems to bottle up a lot of negative feelings or even resentment deep down. Especially with Jayce's actions so to Yaldy, he's probably easy prey. Especially once Shido briefly gets his hands on him. All of it just waiting to blow and with the situation he was in? Wouldn't blame him. He literally chokes the life out of Jayce more than once in the show (at least twice if I counted right) so that's one example in a sense. And considering how the Metaverse is like an outlet for everyone to cut loose without judgement, yeah I can imagine some possibilities with him. That and chatting with folks and oomfs just gave me more ideas on what direction I want to go with regarding him and his arc in this AU.
Butterfly effect and defying fate would be a big theme for both their arcs in this one and why Jayce got a Persona before him. It's also what would ultimately break Viktor's potential rebellion for a while as Yaldy sorta represents complacency and he would be guilting him whenever he tries to defy the rules of the game. I'm considering that one particular thing about Viktor's abilities is that courtesy of Yaldy he can have specific dreams/visions of bad endings/scenarios which transfers to Jayce sometimes and yet due to Yaldy himself constantly rigging the game, they're unable to warn anyone other than vague statements or urging (ex: one of the deadline endings? Subtly urge the group to pick up the pace) so it eats away at him until he breaks completely.
At least that's the general thing I'm thinking right now. I'll mostly just see where this goes as I write and see what ultimately works and what doesn't for his character and there doesn't seem to be enough deep dives about the darker aspects of his character and actions while still making it clear that he's a kind person who wanted to help people.
Arcane's world will possibly play a role too
I was originally gonna keep it completely out of it but then I decided that I'm gonna have Arcane's universe along with maybe some characters make appearances outside of the duo. Namely a small side plot involving the Metaverse and the Arcane being tied together in this AU and "Rifts" being created the more Mementos gets investigated. It ultimately reaches a head in 3rd Semester where Maruki's reality combined with Viktor's abilities enhancing them actually bleed out into Piltover and Zuan. This would cause other characters to look into this as a result. Piltover would also be the new setting for the in media res framing I'm doing as a nod to P5's with Joker's interrogation. This time it would be a trial Jayce and Viktor get taken to for their actions in the past and present (Viktor namely but Jayce willfully volunteers as well). I'll try my best with this one so this will be a doozy and possibly fun worldbuilding.
Finally (for now), Jayce and Viktor will be separated at the beginning!
Yep! Decided to separate the two at the beginning! Namely because I want them to figure things out individually for a while and I'm gonna have JayVik be a MASSIVE slow burn as they have a good amount of issues to sort out first.
So Jayce would be found and taken in by the Yoshizawas (as he ends up getting hit by Mr. Yoshizawa's car by accident, reopening his leg injury), Mr. Yoshizawa basically allowing him to stay with the family and even giving him a job at the TV station for a while as he recovers. He also bonds with the twins which can lead to a fun little study on the two of them individually (which contributes to Jayce being not as lenient towards Maruki after learning what he did to Sumire but he ultimately respects her opinion about him along with Viktor's).
Viktor was hard as he could end up with any candidate due to the state he gets found in (limping in nothing but that blanket wrapped around him) along with how the system in Japan apparently works and then a funny idea hit me: It would be much earlier before P5R's events so what about the Hasegawas (Basically he abruptly gets dropped into Zenkichi's care until everything such as paperwork and files get sorted out)? Admittedly because I really want to write Aoi more and it feels like it would be pretty funny depending on how you interpret Viktor's views on law enforcement in general. That and maybe be a bit of a bad influence to Akane (or at least that's what Zenkichi would think whereas Aoi is like, "They'll be fine you worry too much"). But also some fates might be changed in the process due to timeline interference being another possible recurring theme. Aoi still dies but Zenkichi and Akane might not only stay longer but maybe have different paths as well...
They both would reunite and due to unexpectedly witnessing a good amount of things (Finding Mementos, Jayce's awakening, Kasumi's death, Aoi's death, and then a mental shutdown/psychotic breakdown incident), they get offered a job at Shujin as a teacher (Jayce) and a replacement school nurse (Viktor) respectively along with a place to live which they accepted albeit unaware that it's Shido's machinations at play after Akechi expresses his own suspicions about them. THEN the main game starts after this. Phew!
So that's about it regarding changes! I'm open to suggestions and such so bye for now!